New Orleans newest microbrewery adds to the region's beer options

Eliot Kamenitz / The Times-PicayunePeter Caddoo and Kirk Coco are brewing golden beers and deep, dark ales at the NOLA Brewing Company on Tchoupitoulas Street.

In 2006 Kirk Coco left the Navy and came home to start a brewery in New Orleans. He faced the hurdles of any new business: finding investors, lining up loans and untangling red tape.

His fledgling microbrewery, though, had an extra challenge: Coco didn't know how to make beer.

He needed a brewmaster and everyone said Peter Caddoo, who worked at Dixie for almost two decades, was the best. Just before they were to meet, though, Coco got word that Caddoo had applied for an opening at the Gordon Biersch brew pub. He was crushed. How could he persuade Caddoo to sign on with a brewery that didn't yet own one piece of equipment? His one hope was to appeal to the brewer's thirst for creating new beers.

"You could go to Gordon Biersch, " he told Caddoo, "and probably be happy making their beers everyday. Or we could start this, and you could make your own beers and go into a bar and drink a beer you made."

It worked.

Caddoo took the job, and NOLA Brewing Co. was born.

They leased an old scrap metal yard on Tchoupitoulas Street and filled it with secondhand equipment. They furnished their spartan offices with free couches and hand-painted signs praising their favorite drink ("Beer Is Food, " "Make Beer Not War"). And with a little volunteer labor from the city's beer geeks, the first two brews from New Orleans' only microbrewery arrived at local bars last week.

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BEHIND THE SCENES

Abita Brewery21084 Louisiana 36, Covington, 985.893.3143

Tours, which include samples, are given Wednesdays through Fridays at 2 p.m. and Saturdays at 11 a.m., noon and 1 p.m. at the brewery about a mile west of Abita Springs. Or sip at the Abita Brew Pub, 7201 Holly St., Abita Springs, 985.892.5837.

Heiner Brau Brewery226 Lockwood St., Covington, 985.893.2884

Heiner Brau offers tours each Saturday at 10, 10:45 and 11:30 a.m. Weekday tours are available by appointment only. Beer is not offered for tasting or sale at the brewery. Larger groups should call in advance.

Lazy Magnolia7030 Roscoe Turner Road, Kiln, Miss., 228.467.2727

Tours offered every Saturday at 10:30 a.m.

NOLA Brewing Co.3001 Tchoupitoulas St., 504.613.7727

The new brewery is not yet offering tours.

NOLA Brewing Co.'s blond ale, a golden beer with a hint of fruitiness, is aimed at the drinker of American lager (think Bud and Miller) who wants more flavor.

"This is an entry-level craft beer, " Coco said.

Their brown ale has a richer taste, yet it's still crisp enough to drink in the blazing August heat.

New Orleans was once a beer town. Breweries like Jax, Falstaff and Dixie supplied the South with suds.

"If you bought a beer in Florida, " Coco said, "it would come from New Orleans. If you bought a beer in Georgia, it would come from New Orleans."

Prohibition and the rise of national brands, such as Budweiser, Miller and Coors, killed our local breweries. Dixie, the city's last brewery, stopped making beer here in 2005 after the levees failed.

Our own alternative to pallid mass-market beer is Abita, which locally outsells both Miller and Coors on tap. It began as a microbrewery in 1986. Now the north shore company is a regional brewery that sells 81,000 barrels a year in 40 states, although 60 percent of its beer stays in Louisiana.

"Abita is like Sam Adams throughout the rest of the country, " Caddoo said. "Sam Adams got people to try all these different beers."

But as a blizzard of microbreweries opened across the country, particularly in the West and Northeast, Abita remained the only real player in New Orleans. Local drinkers had to travel outside the state to taste the full range of beer produced by the American craft beer movement.

"My customers like good and different, " said Dan Stein, who stocks more than 100 different bottles at Stein's Deli on Magazine Street at Jackson Avenue and regularly teaches a beer appreciation class. "They like to try new things." But it's often easier for Stein to order imported beers than American microbrews. Many out-of-state microbreweries doubt they'll find enough customers in New Orleans.

Everyday, though, at Uptown bars such as the Bulldog and Cooter Brown's and shops such as Stein's Deli and Martin Wine Cellar, more New Orleanians are seeking beer that doesn't taste primarily like water. We're quickly catching up with the rest of the country. And area brewers are working to meet the growing demand.

German-trained master brewer Henryk Orlik, for example, opened Heiner Brau in downtown Covington a week before Katrina. He makes traditional German beers, distributed mainly on the north shore, along with custom beers for John Besh's Luke restaurant on St. Charles Avenue and the Zea Rotisserie and Grill chain.

This month, Lazy Magnolia beer, Mississippi's only microbrew, went on sale in New Orleans.

Eliot Kamenitz / The Times-PicayuneKirk Coco and Peter Caddoo at their new brewery on Tchoupitoulas Street.

Abita recently released two bold, high-alcohol beers, the new Abbey Ale and the cult-favorite Andygator, in 22-ounce bottles suited for sharing over dinner.

And with NOLA Brewing Co., New Orleans is now a full member of the American microbrewing movement. Coco hopes his microbrewery is just the first of many that will bring beer making back to the city.

"We want four or five to be in New Orleans in the next five years, " he said. And just as Lazy Magnolia and Heiner Brau gave him advice, Coco will help New Orleans' next microbrewery get its beer into kegs.

"Craft beer is really taking hold here, " said Leslie Henderson, the chemical engineer turned brewer who owns Lazy Magnolia. "We are having the revolution that those guys out West and up in the Northeast had 15 years ago."